Barbours spent to boost Mississippi black turnout

Chris McDaniel’s unsuccessful Mississippi Senate campaign is now accusing allies of renominated Sen. Thad Cochran of “race-baiting” in their efforts to boost the six-term incumbent in last month’s GOP runoff, amid reports that the politically-powerful Barbour family helped direct about $145,000 to African-American turnout operations to help Cochran.

According to The Associated Press, the pro-Cochran super PAC Mississippi Conservatives — which has previously acknowledged it was paying African-American leaders to turn out members of their community — sent that money to All Citizens for Mississippi, which focused on black turnout.

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Mississippi Conservatives has close ties to former Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour and is led in part by his nephew, Henry Barbour, who is also an influential member of the Republican National Committee.

McDaniel, the state senator backed by outside conservative groups and grass-roots tea party activists, lost the June 24 runoff by 7,667 votes. That followed a close primary three weeks prior in which McDaniel initially emerged ahead of Cochran by 1,418 votes.

Since the runoff, McDaniel has alleged that Cochran eked out a win based on thousands of irregular votes. The Cochran campaign and some local officials dismiss that charge.

Cochran did, however, appear to perform better among groups that don’t traditionally vote in Republican primaries, including African-American voters.

In a press conference earlier Wednesday, McDaniel attorney Mitch Tyner charged that “[t]he Cochran campaign, through race-baiting, took us back 50 years.”

Henry Barbour denied any wrongdoing. “Mississippi has had enough of false, reckless claims,” Barbour said. “I am not sure who they’ve not called corrupt — just add me to the list of false accusations from the McDaniel folks. We are going to focus on the general.”

Jordan Russell, a spokesman for Cochran’s campaign, shot back: “Sen. Cochran received such tremendous support from the African-American community in Mississippi because he has a 40-year relationship, in elected office, built on respect and fairness to the African-American community.”

“If Chris McDaniel spent more time asking African Americans to vote for him rather than complaining about them participating in the process,” Russell added, “he might have won the electio